


Oh, to be lipsticked!

by Radiolaria



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/F, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-02
Updated: 2013-06-02
Packaged: 2017-12-13 19:06:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,823
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/827793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Radiolaria/pseuds/Radiolaria
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The one time River Song really wishes she could forget.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Oh, to be lipsticked!

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the "River/Clara, unusual circumstances" prompt at [Clara_who](http://clara-who.livejournal.com/20313.html#comments)
> 
> Timeline: Post-Nightmare in Silver & Pre-Name of the Doctor Clara. Pre-Library River.

Stupid roleplaying thingy, she thought. Of course she knew allowing Artie and Angie to come with the Doctor for one trip -ONE trip, not even in the past but in a distant future world- had opened the gate for a wild cavalcade of masquerade, science-fiction cravings and sudden interest in geography, dreams half acted, half, well, dreamed -that was the point of dream after all.

So there was Clara, in a giant-sized pullover and a skirt, underdressed, on a Saturday morning, in the nearby woods, except not so nearby since that kind of history clubs doesn’t naturally sprout from the ground wherever desired, which is a surprise considering the amount of dirt she would be scraping from Artie’s boots after the field trip. Wobbling between boredom and amusement as herds of children in scanty outfits were barrelling about with hand-made weapons, she began bouncing on the spot, in a disillusioned attempt to keep warm. Middle Ages. Good. The supervisor in charge of the group had tried forty minutes ago to engage her in a bit of role-playing herself, by serenading her, in Old English. She could have killed him.

The children were busy learning to weed, old school style. At least she would be able to enlist Artie for the autumn to give her a hand. The woods were shiny under the late morning due, gentle chirping all around, the sun probing timidly through the leaves, the colours surprisingly russet for the season, as Gaius had sung her. Probably.  She had not understood a word he had yodelled, so she guessed rather than listened to. Rhymes. Her feet were leading her deeper in the woods, where the children had ventured not long before in search of suitable rods and sticks. As she hopped aimlessly from dry patches of earth to dry patches of mud, her attention was caught by a musical string of swear words -it seemed, judging by the tone. And it was not Old English, or Proto English even.

Down a path of murky ground, branches so low she thought herself to be moving about in a cave, she followed the voice to find hair, right in her face. Just a big ball of soft, supple -quite touch friendly, even if wildly entangled- golden curls hanging upside down from a tree. Just there in mid-air, swinging above the shadowy path, like a dripping April moon, catching all the light -and humidity, she remarked for herself. And from the big ball -cascade rather- of sunshine obstructing her view came another chain of strange sounds. Definitely swear words, definitely not English. A dark brown voice rang in the clear cold air and up waltzed a creamy fabric finishing its hasty trajectory right on top of Clara’s head. For a moment she was lost in a sea of scents -myrrh and wood and wine- as her vision was impaired by the sheet. Beyond her shroud, the muffled cry of a surprised and annoyed woman came from above. But the following “Oh, darn, _iciefensorge_ ” appeared to come from the ground -which was even worse. At some point the big ball of hair and the woman attached to them must have landed. Magnificent hair that said. Belonging to a velvet-voiced woman, with quite an impressive knowledge of language. Of course she could not hear a thing. And the myrrh was frankly getting to her head.

A pair of hands was fighting its way to her, under the fabric, disentangling and unknotting, where Clara seemed to have completely knotted herself. Sheets. With myrrh all over them. She was about to faint. The sun appeared and the cloth was in the woman’s arms. Said woman was now confused. And not nicely. Tall, rather striking in features -and somehow familiar-, dressed in what must have been the perfect wardrobe of a space Hitchhiker -all funny straps and pockets, unfriendly looking fabric, and big guns at the hip. The picture would not have been complete without the utter bafflement painted on the woman’s features. As if Clara was the one out of place.

Clara automatically smiled, trying to ease the general confusion and frantic scrutinising each seemed to be performing on the other.  There was a fair amount of ogling on the woman’s side. Was there a movie studio in the vicinity? An asylum? A university? That or… Doctor people. They are everywhere, she learnt the hard way. Maybe she was one of the Doctor’s friends. Better find out before an army of little peasants gangs up on them. The babbles of children were drawing near. The woman did not let her utter a word though, gracefully but effectively tackling her and diving with her in the nearest shrubbery. After a roll to which Clara did not understand a thing, the booted leg of the space Tarzan jerking up behind her head to balance them out of the way, they landed on their back unbroken, even if now covered in leaves and soil. From beside her -above, under, where was she in spatial relation to that woman? She had no idea- the woman threw a hand over her mouth to prevent her from talking and hushed her as the group passed them on the trail.

Her hold was strong, yet remarkably delicate. As if used to handle both axes and surgical tools.

Wait. No. Better not go there.

Her whole frame should have been tensed, focused on the children near, yet she was not paying attention to them, instead eyeing Clara. She squinted her eyes -green, and blue, and grey, remarkable- and took a quick breath, searching something in the air. She repressed a smile and released Clara.

The party out of sight, the Amazon looking one jumped to her feet before dusting herself off, letting the vole shabby one snouting her way out of the pile of leaves.

“That was a close call. Did you really think you could pass as…” She gestured at the still lying and flabbergasted Clara. Her hand cockily settled on her hip and her head tilted with what Clara was definitely identifying as swag. “Granted, a fool maybe. But certainly not native.” She nodded in Clara’s direction, hand tugging a curl between her ear, coolly bemused.

“Those rookies. I know you by your looks and time energy all around. Nope. They really need to work harder on that camouflage serum. No use.”

Clara scrambled to get up. Slowly. Not trusting her feet on the floor, half expecting the woman to jump on her at the sight of a deer.

“I mean, I am aware it’s difficult not to, you know,” the woman carried on, nose crinkled, an impish gleam in the eyes. “Grab a garb from the 21st and just parade around.”

Clara collected the twigs and leaves on her tights. Light-headed.  Apparently she had just entered another dimension. Did the Doctor warn her about that? At some point? Perhaps, it would have been shrewd after all to listen to him when he went on about his usual… whatever he goes on about when he babbles. Interestingly, it was exactly the kind of babblings the super Star Trek woman was going on about.

“I knew of an agent,” the woman naughtily snorted. “Who would swear only by Weimar Cabaret uniform. Needless to say the Agency was, well, at least as freaked out than when they discovered I had burnt their whole stock of Vortex Manipulator wristbands.”

Clara folded her arm on her chest, staring, not even bothering to hide her contempt and incomprehension. Space hair and space talks. Fine. Doctor people.

“For months, the agents were gallivanting across time and space with a Vortex Manipulator in necklace form. It kept bouncing on their chest and activating at the most random moment. In popped an agent in the midd…” She stopped, her hands roaming across the air and fabric of the cloth/sheet/myrrh-scented gigantic handkerchief, at last noticing Clara’s glower.

“Sorry, dear?” a toothy grin on the lips, sarcasm at the tip of the eyebrow.

“The Agency? Weimar? What are you talking about?” Try and give your best nanny stare at a full-grown quite visibly in charge nutcase of a woman.

“Darling. How else would you end up in medieval England? Now, give me a hand. I can’t seem to find my medieval spare clothes.” She waved the creamy fabric in the air, rustles and myrrh invading the little corner of the woods. “Not really period appropriate, is it? But at least my pod allowed me an emergency suitcase before ejecting me. You know, the usual. The Middle Ages. 30th century. Egyptian. Victorian. The only trouble is with 20th Earth. They never seem to get it right.”

She was pulling down from the trees above a bag, of which an impossible amount of fabric seemed to be pouring out.

 “This is not.”

 “What? Appropriate. Never.” She shot her a cheeky wink over the shoulder, a camisole with a very loose décolletage in the hand. ”Finding my ship may take time as the cloak was activated. I can’t wander about in these clothes. They might want to burn me. Again.”

“The Middle Ages?”

“It is. My manipulator buggered out in the middle of my ride home. And I end up in a tree. And there are peasants everywhere. But attractive coat rack for once.” She cast a mischievous glance in Clara’s direction.

Good. Millions of strange worlds and probably as many disoriented space Amazon nutcases with a taste for dressing up. And she got the flirty one. She never signed up for that.

“Are you serious?”

She was.

“They are role-playing. It’s a medieval-themed thing. This.” Clara pointed out at the sky, where transmission lines where clearly visible. “Is not the Middle Ages. 21st Century. England.”

The woman looked at her, then at the heaps of clothes and bag in her arms, then at the lines, then at her leather wristband, then back at Clara. The wardrobe found its way to the floor and she just slipped a hand into one of her bottomless alien pockets. With a sigh, she extracted what seemed like a tube of lipstick.

“What is it?” Clara suspected it was about to turn into a laser. Could be dangerous. Why wasn’t she running? No idea.

“Lipstick.”

“You are not chasing medieval peasants and cloaked ships anymore?" Curiosity never kills the cat when curiosity has such hair. And that face. And that body. Perhaps it was even more dangerous than she imagined.

The woman puckered her lips and began applying the lipstick, without haste and with a smouldering assurance, as if about to bite into a ripe fruit. Those lips… Clara was beginning to feel sparkles under her skin. As before, when she was caught in the myrrh-scented web.

“Not anymore, darling.”

***

“Ah. Perhaps you two haven’t met. This is the Doctor’s companion.”

The words that came to Professor River Song’s mind were not Old English poetry.


End file.
